Carnival Town
by ivybluesummers
Summary: A seemingly happy Sendoh never was a believer of the mystics but an encounter with one changes everything. Shounen ai.
1. Version 1 1

At long last... _I've already featured the story years ago but removed it due to the story's haste and unintelligibility. I plan this to take long enough for the plot to finish (hackneyed I think); so I'm sorry for any misfortune that might occur to the one reading this note. "Days of being wild" is a reference to Wong Kar-Wai. Reviews/flames welcome, as always._

**CARNIVAL TOWN Version 1.1**

**_In which Sendoh Decides to Prove the Seer Wrong & the Story Starts_**

* * *

Nighttime furthered the playfulness that resided within the carnival; cloudy-eyed for him, with sufficed breeze to set anew the muted demeanor of the spike-haired lad. A carousel rushed circular by his side as he strides along, surrounded by the seemingly monotonous afterglow of neon lights. Faint are the noises from the animated children whispering through his earshot, and the chauvinistic boisterousness from his teammates made everything an everyday experience. A good 'ole fair, he thought. 

"Uhm... guys, I'm not into this thing..." Akira Sendoh took pride in his skepticism as he pointed out the gypsy-hued tent. The metaphysic justifications for the order of human existence can only get too picturesque for his own preference; he was more convinced that it's just another pleasure for the natural impulses of human thought to thrive in.

"Do you know the word killjoy? Sheesh," Koshino's curse-toned voice was no surprise for Sendoh.

"Besides, Sendoh-san, that seer got us all checked. It's unfair if you get exempted," Hikoichi added. Looking at the whole Ryonan basketball members, Akira Sendoh sighed in surrender.

"But I don't wanna squander—"

"And implying your thriftiness, eh?" Koshino pests himself, handing a couple of bills from his pocket, a smile escaping from the spike-haired.

"It's just a few minutes, Sendoh." Uozumi said, pushing the Ryonan ace towards the neon-dressed tent of velvet textiles.

Seconds more and he's inside the abode. Unwieldy candles glowed faintly, and the room smelt of lavender wax; an all-too-familiar place he got used to from the movies. The feeling interests him to say the least, hinting himself of disquiet for the first time. He expected a wrinkled geezer with locks reaching unbelievable heights, a striking mole and cosmetics too overwhelming for those antiquated skin. His whisper turns into reverberation.

"Hello?"

A slight rustle in front of him, a step backwards; trying to sidestep the uneasiness.

"Sit."

And he obliged; a dictatorial fiber of a spirit manifested as voice. His anxiety bellows, but a tinge of delight resides in him as well; no one in the history of his life ever told of his self-assurance's defeat, until now, and how it works wonders in him was something he cannot intuitively think of.

So the woman wasn't a physicality's threat, an average bore. Physical details are hazy but he never cared at the least. "What d'ya want?" she asks, and gentle at that, too.

"Uhm... a reading?"

"I was asking what kind of reading you want,"

Of course it was. "I dunno. I'm... quite not a fan of this honestly,"

"I know," the woman said more as a statement than an inquisitive mind nourished by an answer. She nods.

Where did the 'know' come from? Or was it just his imagination? Seers are more or less psychoanalysts; a word escaping their mouth hypnotizes their victims and haunts the inner guilt. A vague protestation and the victim's hopes are intertwined by the fact that every seer would say anything to please the one with the dough. He feels betrayed by this epistemic glory.

She looks at the crystal ball on the other hand and seems to notice the growing impatience of the youngster. The lad stares at the unscathed sphere, a pesky vermin he'd like to break.

Groupthink was a much better choice, he realized. Another curse from Koshino would literally burn his ears.

She then looks up; gaze scribbled, understood only with blankness. Sendoh felt like it was infinity; he looks behind him as a gesture of mockery, and his gentle smile was a good disguise.

"Do you know... transcendence? Like you have an affinity with the universe?"

He's voiceless, distressed. "Eh?"

"In your life... did you ever feel happy?"

He smiles, harking back at the days of being wild. A man who hops around into people's lives and the intricacies he calls human interaction; the ways he owns them, the ways he gets possessed by a rapture expressed through physical gesticulations. "Of course!"

He deemed she got a wrong answer. "Happy enough to make you think you could die right there and there?"

"Uhm... of course not. But I'm happy nonetheless." What was her point?

"Akira Sendoh... you're not perfect but you're excellent at what you do,"

"I guess so," he says with an obstinate look. How on earth did she know his name anyway?

"How does it feel?"

"Huh?"

"How does it feel to be excellent in what you do?"

"Fulfilling perhaps. I actually don't think about it." He realized it was going to be a debate too open-ended that he would surrender through agreement. Like the rest of them.

"Is it lonely to be too high?"

"Too high?"

"To look down and watch others from your pedestal?"

"I..."

"You're a clown, Akira Sendoh."

He was the perfect cloak as he smiles, yet again. "I'm not."

"You smile because you want to make a fool of yourself,"

"You say so," he mutters in amusement. But what was the rousing dynamic which has reeled his head just now?

"...because you're wandering alone,"

"I have family and my teammates,"

"...because you want to go home with something to hold on to," she says as the spike-haired stood up, trying to be a benevolent creature despite the narrowed eyes. If it was a war, he's a soldier with thrusts of insulting knives that coated him bloodied; daggers that are even lightyears away from him, piercing his bones that even a scream is not tantamount to the pain.

"...because you're lonely."

He places the bills by the table, walking towards the egress. He swivels one last time to see her liar of a face, but the prophet of fib was already gone.

His pallid shirt seemed soaked. He thinks it was from the practice earlier. By the time his body flexed outside, a plaster of smirk and the coolness of his mood have fooled his acquaintances anew.

"How did it go?" Hikoichi asked.

"There was no one, I just sat in there waiting," Sendoh said, calm as usual.

"I don't feel well. A raincheck, okay," he continued. As the Ryonan ace player promenaded en route for the carnival's exit, Akira Sendoh's silence was deafening; none of his teammates knew what really happened though they were satisfied at the upshot.

As he walks along a feeling of antipathy surges down the street like a ravenous ocean. The pavements gets too narrower for him, and more than the feeling of hostility towards the Freudian oracle was a faith too bad to for his self-assurance to believe, pushing those familiar words away. Hands on his pockets and his pace increases. Of course, he was one of those victims he referred to beforehand, the unlucky ones who mixed reality with wishful thinking. But what was his pipe-dream anyway?

Akira Sendoh is a composite of miniatures of excellence; he never needed anyone to tutor him, he never needed anyone to score a point for his team. He never needed anyone to cultivate the requisites of the body; his prowess can make him conquer even the boundless prances and charms of them all. But what was his pipe-dream, granted there was one in the first place?

He was never lonely. He earns for himself emotional safety. Hours passed, avoiding his house and he kept walking, the memory haunting the blue-eyed youngster of distant coolness and self-buoyancy.

_Let's see who's lonely._

Akira Sendoh's stoicism in the picturesque mysticism has led him into a happenstance to be cynic about his skepticism; but he's still convinced with the buoyancy of his so-called assurance that lonely are the ones who are wet blankets. A striking thought now appears; an experiment of sort, to see if he was indeed a composite of clowns who made a town out of his body, his psyche.

On the benches of the town's park and the carnival man of smiles of cobalt eyes stared meticulously at a certain Shohoku lass. She's more infamous for her obsession over his raven-haired rival than for being a bright student. To be happy with her, to deflate the fox's ego. Yes, that girl; another body to be conquered.

"Akagi Haruko right?"

"Yes,"

"I'm Akira Sendoh."

* * *

_tbc._


	2. Version 1 2

_I forgot to say that the title came from Norah Jones' sophomore album. I also plagiarized a line from Rilke, and the repeating "timid hands held a decent animal" and "kissing the lipless" are references to The Shins._

**CARNIVAL TOWN Version 1.2**

**_In which Sendoh Kisses Haruko & Meets His Past Self_**

* * *

The one-shot of it all never damned his volitions and merely cultivated Sendoh's seeming victory against the seer. No sooner did he realize, too, how effortless it was to squeeze into her and be a transient in her life, a passer-by of the heart. Their encounter was brief he reckoned; and he had to admit that it only took a gesture of introductions before he left her with time, and her brother, too. 

At one time he had that mock game against the Shohoku, he pined her more than anything. Almost. There was an attraction not to the romanticized descriptions of the body but the romanticized heart, a visionary that he considered one of the reasons as to why Shohoku almost won the game that time. He took it as a challenge; the variable in his experiment, and even had the help of Hikoichi. Their first so-called date made him the fifth wheel he also recalled; her brother, Ayako and Miyagi were bodyguards against his reputation.

Now here they are at the all-too-familiar place, Akira and Haruko; dusts move against their footwear, the former motioning the lass for the benches. The playtime tunes of the carnival are no longer heard by the two but the skipping heartbeats. Dewberries could never taste any sweeter, the spike-haired thought as Haruko spoons her last in the can. "This is the troupe's last day," she mutters with a saddened look.

"It is. That's why I brought you here."

She smiled. "It's a nice place they've set up in here,"

"It definitely is. There's a feris wheel up ahead with a good view,"

"Right," she cheered, drinking her water.

Akagi Haruko, a lass meant to serve the lad's purpose, is an antagonist to him. Unbeknownst to the so-called victory that the latter has predicted, Haruko is a mystic herself; an analyst of emotions through which Hanamichi was the first patient, and his brother being the second. It was something that she did not define by the limits of the words, nor was it exactly the attitude that escaped her body like a shining light. A dreamer, a hopeful; a pure heart that is to be tainted the moment she entered the entrance for the larger-than-life wheel. He sits beside her and she fidgets; a sign of an anxious pleasure perhaps?

"How's life?" He asked monotonously, staring at her.

"Uhm... same old I guess. I thought I'd never pass my exams,"

"But you did." He continued her statement, earning a smile. "How's the basketball team?"

If it wasn't for monotony, he thought. "I'm sure they've been making progress?"

They hear their cubicle making a swooshing murmur against their audition, almost like grazing the grounds. They feel like flying again. "They've been fine, more things are coming their way."

A glint in her eyes; the moment he's been waiting for. His left arm make its way to her shoulders, and he can actually feel cold as his skin reaches contact on those soft cotton pink blouse, his fingers exploring her skin. She's warm-blooded with a skin of a snow; he thought, and as his timid hands held this decent animal before him, never could it get any colder.

"Sendoh-san..."

"Akira," he whispers, and time loops like their own ferris wheel ride.

"Right," she says. "..._Akira_."

There was a silhouette of woe that reasons for its synthesis with her voice never earned a single clue for him to decipher. Why should he bother anyway? Here before him is a decent warm-blooded creature that signified vitality even in an utter of a breath, and she should be happy enough to relinquish herself to the rules of the leviathan that is him. He tries to find the depths of this seeming contradiction between a responsive body and an unwell heart (almost a calloused voice for him), but why is he to accomplish such a task when his goal was to dry her wet blanket? Maybe because from inexperience?

He smirks at her, and she can almost feel his warm breath. If it is, then it's not right of a time.

"Why are you so pensive?" he finally jokes, and she makes a heartfelt laugh. Bodies separated in time for the view. "Look," he points out at the vastness of the world that is Kanagawa.

She stares. The amassed whiteness of the clouds that hid the cosmic blueness of the sky and the glimmering stars can be seen from afar. The toothed structures are grunge to the majesty of the night, and if it were not from the white lights that sauntered the darkness from below, she would be led to assume that it was a void of pure obscurity. "A great view," she says.

But it wasn't for the spike-haired. Ants are the people strolling around the carnival as he immerses in the void that are the dim pavements outside it. The flouncing neon lights as the booth follows gravity make his head reel like the jabbing harshness of a downpour against his back. Somehow, there was an oddity in it all that pains him every millisecond of his sight grazing them; like a growing need to be ogled the way he stares at the people. But there was no one to watch him; even Haruko appears to be one of them, too, despite the parallel height they're in. It swooshes again.

"_Is it lonely to be too high?" _

He kisses her suddenly, a probing mouth against her responsive body. But with an unwell heart he feels like kissing the lipless.

Their bodies part in time for the ride to stop. Their booth stands at the very top and the winds are cold. "I'm sorry..." she whispers. "I never really kissed anyone before."

"'Twas okay," he assures her. "Sorry too for kissing you just like that."

But he wasn't rueful, not in the least; it was a victory. Their cubicle starts to move down. His interest, too, started to dwindle like the spike-haired lad has kissed her too many times it became repetitive. But it wasn't from the dullness that made him discover the clue she's been giving him; there was truth which lay hidden behind those words. The way she called his name; it seems she was addressing someone else. _I never really kissed someone_ meant _I was reserving my first kiss to someone else; _but he wasn't rueful at this, not in the least.

"You really like _him_, don't you?"

His arm rests on the window, his head on his hands as he looks at her, smiling. Haruko is purity as she nods her head.

"I'm sorry," she mutters between her sighs, and it's the most authentic gesture of the night.

"No need. I already knew."

"You knew?" Her head swivels up to throw an inquisitive look.

"And y'know he doesn't like you," he digresses, not smiling at all. A pang of guilt rushed through him afterwards. It swooshes again.

"I know," she smiles. "I can see right through it everyday."

"That doesn't sound good at all,"

"But the more I see it the more I... like him."

What purity she has, he thought. Only a naïve romantic can think too optimistic for her own good. A welling feeling unknown to him has suddenly surged.

"Does he know?"

"I think so," she bitterly smiles, "...and that what makes him beautiful."

But how? Beauty is something that reaches contact with the fervor of the senses, something that the senses delight to own; a master to the slaves called the senses. And why not handsome by the way?

When the double doors opened they started to leisurely walk along the hazy outlines of the carnival; he turns his head to see the seer's marquee. He's not lonely like what her so-called mystical assertion told him to be; in fact, he enjoyed her company despite the subtle hints of rejection. A feeling of lightness that a description would render it futile.

It now occurs to him. Beauty is nothing but the beginning of terror which she's still able to endure. Somehow, the lightness has turned into sympathy on account that she herself is lonely. For any romantic is always lonely and always recuperates through loneliness itself; an enduring cycle that translates the feeling into a dualism. She is a positive loneliness.

"But you do know someone else likes you." It was more of a fact than a question.

"Huh? Me? Someone else likes me?" she says, flushed.

"Yes. Would you believe it now? Someone does," he assures her, picturing how flushed would a certain redhead also be.

"But I'm not even pretty..."

"You might get surprised when you look at the signs."

And with that he rests his case. A variable like Akagi Haruko didn't sound as bad as it did the first time; she was as enjoyable as any other sweets, easy to swallow and thus forget (to taste another). His mind documents the data. He takes her home, and her brother was waiting for her. An exchange of goodbyes, and the lass offered him a heartfelt sigh, something that resembled divine illumination. He tendered her nothing on the other hand; after all, she was a body conquered.

So the spike-haired walks for home with an accomplished look. The seer is a piece of fib waiting to victimize others; and it's a good sign that it was the troupe's last day. A thought occurs, and he headed for the carnival to prove his point.

But no sooner did he realize how exhausting it was go there. The entrance felt like a narrow bridge, a dangerous pathway. There he saw Schinichi Maki, and the usual tan of a body almost led Sendoh to assume he was a foreigner. An all-too-familiar alien looks at him, puffing his nicotine out; something he thought Maki would not dare do.

The Kainan captain walks towards him. "What're you doing here?"

He smiled, yet again. "What are you doing here yourself?"

"I thought to pass by. They only come once a year,"

"Right."

"Kiyota and others are inside. Wanna join us?"

"I'd rather not."

"Suit yourself," he says as he puffs. "How are you?"

"It's been long–" both of them said. Maki smirked. "Well," the captain has spoken, "Some things never change,"

"I see one," Sendoh mocked, pointing the other's cigar.

"A past time I learned from the team. And we're supposed to be the good guys."

"I hear you're doing well?"

"Barely. The team's getting too rowdy for me to control. Among other things."

Among other things? He musters enough strength to reply, and he wondered why it took long for his psyche to register the words. Silence crept up, paralyzing him. The residues of lightness are turning into weights that chain him down like an anchor; turning into nervousness. A self-styled past self; what was the rousing dynamic which reeled his head just now?

* * *

_tbc._


	3. Version 1 3

_This is uber-lame. As I was editing the chapter I had an inexplicable urge to link this fic with another storyline, an experiment I used previously in my Naruto fic; so if you have read this chapter already, you'd know by now that this picks up from where "One of These Days" left off, which I would be discontinuing. I also plagiarized some lines from my previous fics (and Rilke), and I think I will never stop making references to The Shins. Feel free to flame._

**CARIVAL TOWN Version 1.3**

**_In which Nighttime Extends, Sendoh Meets a Contrast & the Experiment Resumes_**

* * *

They parted with a few exchanges of words and a countless silences afterwards. 

He wanders aimlessly, and soon it seemed like he was walking across the infinity of the firmament as he makes his way home; there was a nil of possibility of going to, however. The enormity of Kanagawa's abyss hypnotizes him, luring him into its trap. He deems it to be detaining him in the dead of the night as the seeming chasm enjoys while he wallows over a past self; but the so-called haven of a home was another prison.

A rush of blood to the head; his mind's eye halt to thoughts just in time to watch himself smiling over some tanned body he spoke with beforehand. He remembered the days, where after the sugar-coated dreams he lay awoke entwined with the other's body that he often thought it was another dream, another saccharine taste. They were days where he relinquishes his pedestal to step down and be watched; the thrill of the other's eyes as he shoots one hundreds, without missing, and they would smile to themselves to ignite the days and clear restless nights away.

Summer days and autumn nights came with their times too stretched, and a year passed when the feeling became too mutual it choked them, afflicted with a too spacious room that they both ironically found it hard to breathe in. They enjoyed each other's company too much that it was nauseating. Their bodies leave a bitter aftertaste each growing night; all that was left was a nihilistic feeling that it only took minutes to part their ways. One year, twenty-one days and counting; Akira Sendoh had his pipe-dream then.

His feet dragged him to a street where the materialistic lifestyle can ever gets so defined. Across him was a building, jagged in correspondence to aesthetics, and he hears techno music in the distance. As his sight spins a thread of tension, he realizes they were a field of selfsameness as they appear like mushrooms. Some other clubs have started to welcome the waiting people, punk-dressed, appearing to be minding their own business when they're actually assessing themselves at variance with the untailored adults. Even here high school life overflows with deceptive faces.

With a sprawl of his wallet, he takes his ID out and showed it to the bald bouncer.

"Go in."

He delights in the ambience. While the flanking club roared with digitized songs, flickering neon beams which hid the darkest sides of them all; the bar spoke rhythmically with jazz as the band's music resounds in his ear, a soundproof place that paid more attention to mood than the bodies' proximity. He walked then towards the barista. "Give me your best,"

"Sure thing," the other says as he sits.

A slight pivot of his body to explore, and he tries to feel the milieu which all of them savored like an asylum. Minutes after and the glass appears in front of him. The animated automatons have started to speak right through him, hurried voices waiting for hassled replies. Here is a place where, undeclared in the social sphere, stories are given life that the crowd can almost feel it themselves; a place to relinquish one's self to the leviathan that is the pub, a haven of alcohol and chauvinism, of alcohol of femininity, of alcohol and everything else in between.

Sendoh Akira basks in whatever liquor provides; especially tonight. An utter honesty is an indication that one has succumbed to inebriation; something he thinks he longed for like infinity. He takes a sip, burning his throat – he's a swimming thought; at the pub, his weakness.

"Lime vodka please," whispers through his eardrums.

Another shift of the body and there was a group voicing lime vodka out. Whoever theorized groupthink as a justifiable excuse surely luxuriates on colleagues' praises.

"Puh-lease. I ordered it first,"

"Hey, did not! I was the one who thought about it when we were outside!"

He seemed familiar to the spike-haired. "Shut up Hanamichi. Like hell you can drink this one. You're a minor!"

"You toothless gangster! I'll have that drink–"

"Uhm... guys, the bar's too cozy for a fight..."

He stares at the russet-haired youngster who assumed the mediating gesture of a voice. A perfect ordinariness outlined his appearance while his locks graze his forehead at the slightest touch of the air-conditioned breeze. Behind him was the fox, narrowing his eyes as his own lay upon the raven-haired. What was it really that make this creature wince at his presence?

"Huh? Spikey!" Hanamichi's hoarse voice reverberated, and there was an interval of sort before the customers resumed their monotonous talks. "Why are you here?"

He smiles, yet again. "For a drink. It's Akira Sendoh by the way."

"You're Spikey to me."

"You know he took Haruko for a date," teases the mischievous ex-gangster, earning him a thump in the head. Obviously their captain was there, too; he looked more of a guard with his black shirt, the spike-haired thought. "What was that for?"

"What!" Hanamichi declares next, his face blighted from fiery eyes.

It hit him no intimidation. "It's not necessarily a date, Sakuragi."

"You're so slow, Hanamichi. And with a Ryonan at that," Miyagi joins the pandemonium.

Gathering all politeness and he excuses himself; from the raucous symptoms of immaturity, away from the starkness that're Rukawa's eyes, from thieves annulling his triumph, away from the disarray of words piercing everything like bullets. He walks for the washroom, the metal knob too cold for him, and with enough force confined himself within its four walls, and it smelt of decontaminators – an odor he found to be absurdly comforting.

He looks at his reflection, flexing his fingers to caress the velvety spikes of his hair, and he becomes uplifted at the handsome man in the mirror. A tinge of happiness can be dredged within the soulful azure eyes gawking at him as the feeling slithers from his feet, moving its clutch to his back and his arms. The thought intoxicates him.

He suddenly remembers Haruko. Beauty is the beginning of terror which he's still able to endure. Inspecting the almost-pale skin of the man before him, he revels in such terror embodied within him, knowing all-too-well how it engulfs every hearts and minds. He relishes the terror brought by the power of silken locks and blue eyes, of smiles and contoured flesh.

"_You smile because you want to make a fool of yourself,"_

Now where did that come from?

A seemingly genuine beam turns into a grimaced smile. Fools are the lifeless automatons who forgot their mouths at their house and are therefore silences in the social order. Foolishness is an art that lifelessness seeks to master a mindset of sorts, like a haunting baroque sculpture, desiring nothing more but the flouncing passiveness reeking of wounds of the heart and mind. Even with a sigh, the image before him percolated a golden aura which proved otherwise. _That blasted fucked-up seer._

"_...because you're wandering alone," _There're countless stars to own, and he possessed them all. He grimaces; what was the rousing dynamic which has reeled his head just now?

"_You're a clown, Akira Sendoh."_

The faucet surges with oceanic jewels, slightly coating his shirt wet, drenching his face; and trying to see if the waters would wash away the grimace and paint him a better version of himself. Fingers strain themselves, almost abrading; thereupon closing his eyes as weightlessness metamorphose into a ton of split needles as the water runs ever so deep. At the pub; his weakness.

"Hello? Excuse me? Why is this locked?" He wheels his head at the door. Three knocks come forth and he walks to open it; he was going out anyway. He takes a last glimpse at the man before the mirror, and he sees a handsome one.

He realized how nighttime stretched itself too much when the skies began to show the glimmering sparklers and the moon turned into crescent platinum. The spike-haired lad cared not in the very least, nor did the Shohoku Basketball Team as Hanamichi squeals as he speaks. Sendoh occupied a seat beside the barista while the all-too-familiar faces secured a corner and created their own world amongst other dimensions that the customers have fashioned for themselves. The spike-haired only shared a paradigm on the other hand.

"I'ma soa–ring prince fo–r my waiting lo-lo–ve... lovey prin-cess!"

He observes them all, and he hides a sardonic smile when Miyagi professes a monogamous intimacy; who was he referring to? Hisashi Mitsui seizes his glass, downing the colorless alcohol with a rough swig it became apparent that he's as feeble as Hanamichi, wherefore the ex-gangster and the redheaded rookie clutched each other's shoulders with an arm and began their rubbish songs with their coarse voices.

"Turn it down a bit will you?" A faceless person warns.

Despite Akagi's darkened face, the blue-eyed began to notice a blush, and Sendoh had to give him credit as the leviathan of the team when he thumped the two lads, the force of which was too strong than the usual. His so-called rival can be seen in the distance, behind the laughing face of Miyagi; there is solemnity behind those eyes as his flushed cheeks mark drunkenness. Rukawa gulps his blue alcohol, and after a minute he downs another. He stares straightforwardly; what chasm is he looking into?

Applause has furthered this rather disturbing act, only making those ice blue eyes like a gravity of sorts, a shining light; and Sendoh thought he only saw those eyes in court. Yes, he thought, the lovely games with the venerable companion called the snifter.

And then he found it again, the man of fortuity.

A muffled but jubilant sigh hid between closed eyes; nodding his head, puckering his lip. He thanks the midnight afterglow like a god as it swept the windows of the bar, and the air-conditioned zenith rushed like spring time. His body stayed still as Kiminobu Kogure conforms to the so-called social sphere and joins the madness and commotion that are his teammates. Despite the apocalyptic sight, he is a golden sun rushing in the crayons of a field while the pristine waters flow. What a contrast he is to the brutes at the corner; at the pub, his weakness.

He revels in the frailty of it all, this embodiment of ordinariness. Akira Sendoh is a venerable warrior of a youngster who thought he's better off intruding someone else's face (outlined by the same wavelength of physicality) and resume his little experiment. But there was a psychological offense against him, a ballistic strike as the russet-eyed nourishes the distended egos of his teammates. He acts like a host of multiple idiosyncrasies it almost haunted the spike-haired to see them all, a kind of terror which defeated everyone else through difference, and bestowed lightness to him nevertheless.

The growing curiosity devours him; a requisite to be answered, and immediately at that. But how?

And so over the next days, the venerable spike-haired would have to spend his dough and waste his time within the soundproof walls of this saloon, investing a hope for the thrill of introductions, something he had never felt before. The brown-haired, however, didn't come for two weeks; maybe he isn't the alcoholic type? Maybe he really lived up to ordinariness' name? Maybe he has somebody else? Maybe he's inexperienced? It was an adolescence of a twilight which left him sleepless, but an excited mind confronting such kind of absence would cultivate a sense of disinterest, and he would have to revel in another kind of terror. He doesn't even _know_ him to boot.

But with another schedule of mock game he felt like a schizophrenic; and all would be history.

The sun's glaring orb was already receding into a darkly orange combustion and the clouds have stockpiled to a grayish hue. All the exhaustion of the day has come to pass through their bodies and Kogure takes his stride with an odd meticulousness. With suspicious eyes and a frown plastered on his face, he endeavors to learn the depths of meanings which lay hidden in all the hysterical antics, from the first day up to this moment where a certain raven-haired followed him like a dog. A psychosomatic attempt to digress from this frustration only led him to shift his body.

Rukawa stops, shuddering.

"Is there anything you want Rukawa?"

"I... tutor me."

"I'm sorry Rukawa, that won't work anymore. Where d'ya go home? I thought you're north?"

"Change of route."

Kogure raises an eyebrow. "Really? Won't you get tired?"

"Kogure-san!" And so the spike-haired found him again. The other has swiveled yet again, and the fox raises his own eyebrow.

The Ryonan sophomore sees more colors than a human can possibly see.

"Uhm... Ryonan?"

"Uh, yes, I'm from Ryonan. It's Akira Sendoh,"

"Oh," sighs Kogure as Rukawa sardonically smiles. "Ah... that Sendoh."

"Yes. We're neighbors?"

"No..." he looks at his teammate, "I... I just stopped because Rukawa is here,"

"Uhuh."

"Anyway, nice meeting you Sendoh-san,"

He thought he heard a chattering breath in the distance. "Yeah. Me too," he smiles, scratching his head for special effects. He raises his other hand, holding Kogure's; he thought it felt too smooth for a basketball player.

* * *

_tbc._


	4. Version 2 1

_Thanks to Maurice Merleau-Ponty and The Shins for references._

**CARNIVAL TOWN Version 2.1**

_**In which Kogure Meets the Spike-haired Again, Sendoh Deliberates & the Open-ended Dispute Begins**_

* * *

It occurred to him now. 

Intimacy is an appreciation of pleasure whence fortuity marked flash seconds; for if it becomes too mature it leaves an acrid taste. And another thing was that daytime only makes these candy-coated moments too raw, and so Sendoh Akira preferred the moonbeams, the way the cool breeze would tingle him for all the warmth it provides; and alcohol would be a best friend. Now it had been three days since he re-captured this sweet creature; after the supposed lameness of his introduction he never re-established contact with Kogure, owing to a hesitant handsomeness against a delicate (but always absent) russet-eyed, owing to a wasted time – and owing to a growing disinterest. Never the less it became a wondrous contradiction for him as a realization illumines the dark caverns of his mind to unconsciously pine for the brown-haired lad as days pass by with his non-presence. So much so that he began with the subtle squeals of the tongue, a constant urge to go back at the bar; and to create his own syllogisms which defied the laws of logic. How could a teddy bear resemble Kogure in any way, a withering plant, or even his bed sheets?

He finds it that this underdog of a basketball player never really drew strength from the game itself; and despite his mediocre abilities it seemed to have power over his teammates. With a three-point shot and a rhythmic voice he has crushed his own team's dreams to reach Inter High. What a contrast really; and finally yielding to the compulsion to challenge such a force he went back to the saloon three days after and saw Kogure, by himself, downing his own venerable vodka. And like his usual insinuations, he made his way towards him, investing all his earned wealth of emotional safety.

Kiminobu Kogure has often thought of himself an insipid, accidental existence; and he has often proved to himself, too, how perfectly such insipidness worked well when adapting to the charades of people, these little games of so-called humanness. But it was exactly this bland of a personality which made him smarter than everyone else; for he can always brew affinities and measurements that seventy-percent of the time he's one thought ahead of the other. One discourse can mean one thousand possibilities, and only thirty percent of the time do his judgments become hazy and empty.

And to further a sense of pride within him was also and precisely this all-too-human normality which attracted the atypical spirits, the untimely embodiments of the higher standards of them all. For surely, yet surely; even in the distance he can sense the spike-haired's eyes watching him over a silhouette of a perch, a psychological human force, beckoning him to come down.

So for the both of them, they spend the night with sheepish talks and quips, with compliments and accordant gratitude, with half-meant gestures of touching hands and a beacon for the body's respite. Seven minutes of surging words for introductions and almost two hours of gestured words fueled by alcohol Sendoh risks himself with a question next.

"Why are you here?"

Kogure's reply was a murmur, almost like a secret to keep. "Oh you know, same old excuse. Among other things."

Among other things? He thought he heard that before. Sendoh can feel his cheeks burn; and despite the vagueness that the reply has bestowed upon him, a feeling of empathy emerges to his eyes and he felt serious this time. "I always felt the other way around," he smiles, "I want to remember, so I go here."

"Well at least you got an excuse when you're drunk," the other kids, sipping his liquor. "Memories are beautiful but only those you want to live with,"

"What was that?"

He slowly repeats them as Sendoh buys enough time to hark back those joys which lay hidden in some kind of anonymity. He forgot their faces (even Haruko), but he remembers the feelings each of the moments have given him, measuring their relative difference between them all, and only then was he confounded, ambiguous past-selves who wished oblivion, if not a headstrong self towards the future. Is this bitter liquid to blame? He cannot tell; he was only seeing the russet-eyed.

"Are you all right?"

He snaps; at the pub, his weakness.

"Yeah. Listless me, ne?" he takes a sip, emptying his glass. The crushed ice are left melting.

"Not at all," the other says, "I think you just remembered something."

"Really perceptive, Kimi-kun. You mind me calling you that?"

He hesitates. "Not at all."

Silence paralyzes them for minutes. "You're not as poker-faced as what they've told me, Ayako and Miyagi,"

This earns a smile, the seemingly first genuine act of the day. "That defies the rules of first impressions."

Kogure's reply was a wholehearted laugh. "And me? I've always thought I was too boring."

"I've always thought of that. Now we're in this place for three hours."

Kogure empties his own glass. "Yeah, but there's actually no telling, right?"

Yes, the gesture he's waiting for. "We'll see..."

And although Kiminobu Kogure can only aggregate blurred visions and reasons as to why he's suddenly staring at the far-eyed wide kind of dark fields and grey pavements as he slouches himself on the spike-haired's black Pontiac Solstice; he spends the night in Sendoh's room, he sleeps with him. His voice fades into soft rhythms; his exhaustion entwined with the blue-eyed's snores of triumph. And as he dreams, he sees himself stepping into a void, a blackness of unknown territory; as his sight outlines a full moon, he suddenly transports himself into an amusement park, and he sees the happy faces, riding carousels and bump cars and ferris wheels. In front of him is Sendoh, walking with cool demeanor, smiling. The feeling of lightness grabs him, infecting him; and as he snores himself to slumber, he too would smile.

But the morning soon seizes this midnight revelry and the fresh sunbeams will touch the brown-haired's eyes, opening them anew; and with this haste of a time was also the sight of a sleeping frailty that is Sendoh. It's Sunday and the warm breeze of eight in the morning placates him; school works take their rest, the basketball retires momentarily. He gently pulls himself out of the spike-haired's grasp and quietly dons his clothes, despite the flourishing hesitation and in spite of the soft mattress calling his body.

It's 8:25 as he turns the knob; it hit him no worry since his parents only visit him during holidays. His refined touch against the door made a soft cracking sound, worrying him and takes a last glimpse at the sophomore.

There was a smudge of beauty rousing within Kogure, an effluence of emotions; somehow, the brittle spirit of Sendoh has suddenly metamorphosed into a crippled dog and needing provisions. It effects something like a concern for being condescending, or something like a universal duty to be this sleeping frailty's safeguard; for after all proximity cannot be the content of intimacy for him. Certainly, yet certainly; the way their differences in character cluster together into a conflagration of sorts, a fairy tale of sorts. He blames his incorrigible state of mind to care for others, a sickness triggered only with a touch, or vague hints; at the doorway, his weakness.

And so he leaves with his own emotional investments.

Unbeknownst to the brown-haired lad, however, Akira Sendoh was thirty minutes ahead of him, suddenly opening his eyes as the closed door reverberates through his earshot. A grin escapes to his mouth, fully waking himself up with wanton thoughts, and a waning weight within him has made him yawn happily.

It came upon him to make it a necessity to break upon himself everything he's learned so far and create a better version of him. This owes not to the dainty touches, to an appreciation of neither pleasure nor the sweet words escaping both from their lips. He sighs in contentment as he sits, leaning his back by the bed's frame.

Yes, he has proved the seer wrong.

But at the same time, lonely are the ones who're not wet blankets. It's shallow, almost like an unfounded superstition. And but all the same, there is an ambiguity in all these; his handsomeness still seems to address a self who constantly relates his past in the decisions of the present, decisions which ultimately try to cogitate the future. What does it hold for him? If he gives Kogure a buzz, would the russet-eyed even bother? If Kogure accepts his offer, would he also even bother?

A sense of terror bursts beautifully within him. Yes, he thought; the lonely is such a delicate thing.

* * *

_tbc._


	5. Version 2 2

_Standard disclaimers apply. The last part is the re-creation of the original 2nd chapter of Carnival Town I wrote years ago (it had a happy ending before). And since the series is about basketball, I made a reference to it._

**CARNIVAL TOWN Version 2.2**

**_In which Sendoh Wins His Odd Conviction Back & Rukawa Reveals His True Nature_**

* * *

The long tête-à-têtes fall into minutes and turning into the day's hours; buzzes turn into movies and sometimes home videos, and the seemingly happy sighs change into the silence of the bodies, and the night would finally clear them both away. These seemingly tedious weekend schedules turn into weekdays and never did Kogure soon realize these little carousing until the spike-haired phoned him two days after their first all-too-secret encounter. The frailty of Sendoh and the desire to foster a residue of depth within have preceded this feeling of lightheartedness, and but the russet-eyed has often proved to himself how startling it was, how convenient of a riposte it was to accept the other's offer and thus avail time and emotional strength for himself, and for the blue-eyed too. 

An hour after lunch break and the sunlight flares up above the light cerulean skies as more soon-to-be students sprawl themselves into the lobby's seats. An intimidating waft of the fans can be heard at the corner, and the nurse's heels against the tiles make a clacking echo every minute; she was handling all the forms and has already convalesced from all the annoyances of dreary inquiries beforehand. She smiles as she hands an application form to Kogure, and the youngster replies with an anxious grin.

"I'm sorry you have to go here, too," he says, motioning the spike-haired to a table.

"It's too warm in here."

"Yeah. But take all these applicants out and it's a lot cooler."

"I bet it is. Hey look," his finger touches the glossy paper, and a smirk can be seen on his face. "It asks your civil status."

"Ha. What do you think?"

"Say it's complicated. Oh wait, there's no such thing, ne?" he meekly beams, handing the other a pen. "What're you gonna take?"

"Oh y'know. I've been afflicted with the same disease as any other nurse. Or so they say at first,"

"But I don't think you can take care of chemistry right?" He grins, yet again. "And imagine the corpses you're gonna dissect," he continues.

"Oh shut it, will you? I'm already getting uptight here,"

"Alright, alright. I'm going to the canteen. Y'want something?"

"Uh, anything. I'll be out after five minutes anyway."

"I'll meet you outside then." so he leaves, and opens the wooden double doors of the university. Outside was an open field of sorts, and he can make out the long blades of grass swerving through the breeze's haste. Several others are strolling themselves to idleness, and their formal garbs whistled a strange mood that welled in him like a tear. He takes his own step, and at his right was a soccer field; the wars of the bodies' gyration against the ball launched another pang right through him and so he avoids the sight. What was it really that reeled his head just now?

Perhaps this was a feeling of enthusiasm, the thrill of anonymity versus the world's end that is the vastness of Japan; Tokyo was surrounded by serrated structures of glass and concrete and steel, and but all these meant more than just the form. Here lay more neon lights and more easily accessible people, bound by an ambience of limitless liberalism, bound by hypnotic traps of a dizzying night; and not only because of a busied time but because Tokyo offered a higher standard and a higher perfection. And the comparison against Kanagawa doesn't just end there. The latter was trite, and the bays sometimes sicken him. And now that he deliberates such an open-ended dispute within him, Japan, too, is such a banal place when at variance to the totality of the world. He suddenly felt betrayed by the seeming glory of Kanagawa.

A voice beckons him from behind. A tap of his shoulder told him it wasn't Kogure.

"Why're you here?"

"Shinichi."

He sips his soda. "Well? What're you doing here? Ah yes... you're with him."

"Kanagawa got me bored."

"Everything gets you bored, Akira."

He raises an eyebrow. "And what's that supposed to mean?"

"You're the smarter one right?" he mumbles, downing his soda.

"I feel a lot lighter–"

"Now that you're with him? Well that's good to know, if you really feel that way that is."

"So you're betting time now? And why're you here anyway?"

He crushes the can, throwing it to the bin; and scoring three points. "I'm trying my luck. Passed the interview, now I got an exam in about an hour. And yes, I'm betting one month."

"He's not like you," he hisses, trying to sustain an unruffled disposition.

"He's not like you either."

"You think I don't have the right to change?"

"Look Akira," he pats his right shoulder, "everyone has the right to change. But I don't think you're the type who wants to change. You're too excellent in what you do to give it up just now."

He swivels his sight at the soccer field, and then to the open seas of the world embodied by the grassy fields. "You're... you're wrong. I like him," he stares at the Kainan captain.

"And you've told me you liked Haruko, too."

"I did. But she's... too perfect. And uh... well, forgettable."

"Anyway, I cannot be a judge of all these," the other has said, dusting off his shirt. "And now I take back my bet. Don't break him. He's stronger than me, and you direly need him."

"Besides... someone else is planning to be a thief."

Both of them walked across for the building now, and they could feel themselves laughing at the hilarity of it. "So you've noticed it, too? I thought I was the only one who suspected it," he grins.

"Now that I imagine him, he looks like your twin."

"Are you patronizing me Shinichi?"

The other has ogled long enough at his spikes, touching them next. "Take these down and you'll look like him,"

"Shut it."

Maki smirks. "If I don't pass the exam I might go abroad. You won't have a psychiatrist anymore."

"Well I don't need one now. But good luck anyway."

"Thanks," he says. The soon-to-be former captain of Kainan leaves with a sigh of goodbye, a silence which meant more meaningful than the denotations of the words. There was a sense of melancholy coursing to them both, for the spike-haired knew that Shinichi Maki will forfeit his exam.

"There you are,"

He snaps; at the fields, his weakness. "I'm sorry, I didn't bring anything."

The other smiles, "No problem. I got an interview next week. I'm hoping for the best."

"Don't you have a spiel or something?" he laughs, motioning the russet-eyed for the university's park. "Tokyo has more than enough choices for lunch I might get confused,"

"Anything should be fine."

"Where're you going next?" he says after a silence of the hearts, tweaking his switch with a finger and his car squeals. He opens the door.

"Well I've had too many absences now in the team... but then by the time we get there the gym's gonna be closed."

Rough noises are heard and he presses the gas. "Well we haven't finished Seven Samurai," he hints, and the car ran its course like a bullet.

But no sooner did they realize their only common feature as they spotted the nearby court at Kanagawa's square. It's been three hours of drooped bodies, and the game of their lives was the only option they know of rekindling everything and clearing the night away, the psychical force of touching bodies; and the penetrating sounds of their sneakers against the asphalt make it all exhilarating. The night is stretched with no stars at all, and even the moon sparkled no more than a fading beacon like a lamp from a lighthouse. The air is too warm but it was exactly what they're after; people seemed to be dead, and only the hastening roars of the cars can be heard from afar. Their bodies set adrift at the slightest rhythm of the red-hued ball previously lodged in the spike-haired's car.

"I don't stand a chance, I know, but don't go soft on me either," the russet-eyed has said as he dribbles. "Maybe you can teach me a thing or two after this."

"Maybe," he whistles, and a skip of the watch's hands signals the game. He easily grabs the ball with a reflex of the body.

A crossover dribble and Kogure chases the red orb while he's suddenly out of breath. The other runs for the ring, elated, jumping with enough height; hauling up his fingers and the ball moves with a dainty touch, dropping into the basket. "Two-zero," he smirks, and passes the ball to Kogure.

The russet-eyed thinks of his ordeal, trying to predict the future. A crossover dribble between his legs as the ball bounces dreamily against his hands, trying to defend. He runs like a madman, protecting the ball. A swooshing sound escapes from his shoes and Sendoh flung his arms wide, defending the basket. So Kogure dribbles once, stepping back, faking to shoot.

This hit Sendoh no intimidation. He steals, spinning his body as he dribbles. Kogure has predicted it right and he now gyrated his own body so that they're face to face, and stole the orb with a rough touch. "Hey, foul," the other has said.

"Calling your own foul," Kogure muttered, immersed in the game. He's suddenly changed himself into another idiosyncrasy while Sendoh tries his luck. He has proved to himself that this metamorphosis caused ecstasy way beyond being a basketball player itself, and he's suddenly thought of the ways which differentiate himself to this pale youngster before him. He tries to shoot, but Sendoh was taller.

He blocked; Sendoh fakes, and he fell for it. But there was something that made it mean something else.

"Five-zero, Kimi-kun."

Kogure makes a grimacing smile. The ball was passed to him again, and he shifts his weight to his right and ran away from the basket, seeing if a three-point shot is permissible. He dribbles with a lower stature, the bounces countless. He shoots, and he misses. What was it really that differentiated him from this youngster before him? The russet-eyed always was the believer of intimacy's sanctity, the tenet of the idealist heart and an almost naïve body; wherefore despite endless rationalizations he sought for himself transcendence, even if it took years. He believes of the hopeful soul receiving the blessing and the gift of another's hopeful soul, but here he is, with more than apathy to the game, single-minded by a pursuit of an answer. "I got a putback," the spike-haired said, calm as usual.

He suddenly stole the ball and tried to shoot it.

"Seven-two. Not bad,"

The power of social possibilities, he thought, has more than enough force to tumble down the remaining purity within each and everyone on this earth. It encompasses a distortion of a romantic into a pessimist, surpassing even eroticism. But this is not what he complains about; what was it really that differentiated him from the youngster?

"Ten-two Ki–"

"Sempai." He snaps; at the court, his weakness.

The meshed steel fence of the court makes a soft noise as Rukawa opens the entry with narrowed eyes, his arms securing his bicycle. Of all people, Kogure thought; he was almost afraid of the voice that kept like a mantra on his audition, but there was something in him that urged him to speak. The raven-haired meanders, chaining his bicycle as it leans by the fence.

"What're you doing here?" Sendoh raised an eyebrow, admitting a sense of jealousy despite the consideration of a possibility that Rukawa only meant to play himself.

Kogure smiles. "Hello Rukawa. It's eight, aren't your parents looking for you?"

"They're not here," he coolly says, staring into the blue-eyed, admitting a sense of inexplicable feeling, like he's looking at himself. He walks towards them both. "One on one, Spikey."

"I'm playing with him."

And yet it meant more than just a game. A sweatdrop from Kogure's forehead trickles down with utter anxiety, admitting a sense of rivalry between them, which of course went way beyond being basketball players. He blushes at the thought. "If Kimi-kun assents, then I'll be more than happy to play with you," Sendoh says with a smile, hiding his own sense of intimidation.

Now the decision, related to his past thoughts, addresses a current issue here. What would happen if he lets them both play? Will animosity rise beyond the control of his mediating gestures? Is this a power struggle of sorts? Who will win? Who is he betting to win?

"I don't have the knack to score well anyway," he says.

"Be referee then," Rukawa says, almost like a whisper. And yet it meant more than just being a referee.

Foreseeing the danger, "I'd rather watch."

And so for thirty minutes he slouched at the benches, drinking his water, his sight attending to the game before him. Bodies graze each other with more than enough aggression, and creating a distance Sendoh releases the ball with his outside hand as it rolls on the rim and dropping in a second. He schemes his body into full gyration, faking to shoot, and Rukawa fakes to block. He shoots, he misses, Rukawa gets the rebound. He puts the ball back in, and he scores two. It almost became a tournament as more fancy shots re-appear before Kogure, and now he felt like he was watching from afar, out of sight. Seconds turn into minutes which turned into long and cosmic falls of the red sphere into the basket, slow-paced and their shots are more fatal. Thirty minutes passed, and he saw them both panting for oxygen.

"You're both exhausted," was the only thing Kogure said.

"27-29, he won," Sendoh says between his breaths.

Rukawa stares too deep Kogure felt like his eyes were jabbing him. The fox faces the clown, and he can see his lips move in slow-motion.

"That's a good game, Rukawa," the spike-haired genuinely comments.

"It's for him."

"What?"

"Don't play dumb."

And after ten minutes, Rukawa was already dozing off in his bicycle, away from them both. However, his audacity and seeming boisterousness lingered in the place that it took more than twenty minutes of silence between the two, waiting for Rukawa to dissipate like a vapor. Twenty minutes of time, too, meant infinity of thoughts which crazed not only the deliberating Kogure, but the all-too-excellent Sendoh who took his defeat nonchalantly. Even if this thief of a fox try, his handsomeness can conquer any body; including the one beside him. Kogure on the other hand, succumbed to the urgency of his concern. There was no denying it. Drinking his water, he turns to the blue-eyed.

"Uhm... 'Kira,"

"Hmm?" the chap whispered, foreshadowing everything.

"What d'ya think of relationships?"

Sendoh Akira assures himself that he's still an emotional advocate of an all-too-excellent beauty and his experiment about unfounded speculations of the idealist heart is still in motion. It was more than a premonition in his part now for the question to be roused but quite indescribably his surprise is at the inappropriateness of everything, the place, the mood. He is a carnival man who takes affairs in life as if they're the prolonged impulses of his body, some custom wisdom he's acquired for years, from Shinichi. Why does he have to change now, when it's this wisdom that conquered Kogure?

For this wisdom earns emotional well-being; for he thought that he was never an emanating frailty to the russet-eyed. Comfort and solace belonged to him, and gestures of gratitude belong to Kogure. Sendoh has the title emotional apotheosis, while Kogure is its devout believer. "Eh?"

"My stance's no more but pessimistic, Kimi-kun. It's gonna be problem for us,"

He rouses interest however. "Enlighten me then. I'm sure it's just a pinch in the cheek,"

Sendoh heaves a sigh, drinking water afterwards, readying himself. "Relationships are futile unless it works for someone who believes in it."

"Uh... elaborate?"

"Why is there intimate relationship?"

"To be able to keep it."

And now it was turning into a disbelief on his part, this Kogure before him.

"But is it only the way for men to perceive each other? To whom do we promise? To a god? Goddesses? To nature?" What was it really that reeled his head just now?

"I rather think that a promise to a relationship is more than a proof, and not because a couple offer themselves to them,"

A welling exasperation surges from within him. "But what if the person doesn't deserve a promise at all?"

Silence. Whom was he referring to?

"It's just an assurance," he finally says.

"What's wrong with having faith?"

He holds the ball tightly, dribbling it. "We're free to do whatever we want. I just think that faith becomes boring at the end, it becomes meaningless..."

"...and I don't want that to happen to us," the spike-haired continues in a whisper, leaning closer, caressing Kogure's cheek.

Isn't that an assurance in itself? Kogure says no more and surrenders to the stirring charm before him, and but a sense of distress looms from somewhere; here lays an unspoken truth between him and the blue-eyed youngster, something way beyond his remote concern for a difference.

* * *

_tbc._


	6. Version 3

_References to The Shins, Fiona Apple and Tori Amos._

**CARNIVAL TOWN Version 3**

**_In which the Story Turns to a Dialogue of Boredom & Rukawa Reveals His True Nature Again_**

* * *

Jewels trickled down the foliage and the university's fields are humid at the slightest stroke, while the sun appears, only to recede behind the vertical of pallid clouds. In flash seconds it re-appears with an immaculate blueness against the sky; ever so fresh, the way the morning ached for a view. It proved otherwise for the vice-captain however. The clock ticks too rapidly, and he can even hear the pulsating heartbeat of the examinee beside him. The lukewarm air within the room swirls into unnoticeable anxiety, and Kogure thinks he's seen better days, while the other seniors reclined themselves with flexing legs and hesitant fingers, struggling to burrow correct answers up the ceiling like an archeologist, almost snapping their necks. 

It's been three weeks since. Words and silences before were hued with appreciation and sensibility. Both of them smelt of jasmine and cherry and lavender while the nights retire with sweet taste; they reveled in mere presence, bound with the ceaseless sighs of ease, unbound from the limits of bodily interaction. The beauty in all these is that these're memories accompanied with a sense of merit and subtlety, feelings which take them both to surprise despite the repetitiveness.

And yet surely, the brown-haired is always a thought ahead of everybody else. An attempt to be imperceptible when someone recoils in a conversation is a lame excuse for Kogure; so are the vacant eyes, the screaming insincerity of the words, the empty concerns. Everything was growing too chronic, and yet there was nothing to do but thrive in such bitterness. Sendoh Akira has become frailer than ever, no longer capable of implicitness as to the demands of his ever-so-frail existence. And the russet-eyed, fastened with a vague sense of obligation to protect him, has endured three weeks of haziness of his daily encounters with Sendoh.

He stands up, folding the sheet, taking a last look, reserving a slot for college. He gives it to the examiner, uneasily smiling. "Here,"

"Yup. Results in three days. Good luck."

"Thanks."

And so he leaves, assuring himself. The placidness of the morning turns into the cruelty of the afternoon and the sunlight scorches his skin. The immensity of the plains before him whelms his tired soul, quenching a thirst for seeing new and better things. His lips quiver to form a smile, an act of voluntariness that the thought of lunch with the spike-haired almost slipped into his mind; and when he approached the Pontiac Solstice at the car park Sendoh was already holding take-out bags. He takes his glasses off and wiped it with his sleeves, trying to see if it would help him set his eyes on Sendoh anew.

"How was it?" the spike-haired hands the brown paper bag, smiling.

"'Twas okay."

"Of course. You've been studying too much to fail it yes?"

"Uhuh. Thanks," he says, trying to be nonchalant but failing miserably.

Minutes passed and the clicking chopsticks are deafening for them. Silence has been more or less a way to escape the dullness which radiated flourishingly, and Kogure's almost afraid that a word escaping from Sendoh might writhe him to the floor. Trading the relationship into tea and sympathy was the better barter for them; for even Sendoh's susceptibility to a beauty's terror is beginning to wane, cultivating a lackadaisical attitude, although regretfully at that. The car's door is open enough for some crisp air, and the chirping birds are begging for their food.

"Where to next?" Sendoh attempts to break the ice.

"I don't know," was the meek reply, "the team's readying for Inter High."

"Well I can tour you to Ryonan, meet them and all, ne?"

This sparks an interest. "You sure?"

"Yeah yeah sure," he smiles, handing Kogure the bottled drink.

"I've always meant to see you guys play,"

"Uhuh..."

And so the dryness of the conversation resumes. Kogure would soon talk about his own basketball team and Sendoh would be as listless, whereupon he would stare at the blue jays squeaking gratefulness at the leftover noodles, and the sight would be a much better view. It now appears for the spike-haired that the experiment was botched to be even resumed, leading itself to secure and take a much higher standard more than anything, a higher perfection which thus made this creature beside him merely bordering on disqualification and easy access. Looking at the jays presumably happy, he admits a sense of envy and regret at the same time.

He looks at the brown-haired, this man of fortuity; Kogure's smiles begin to be repulsive, and the way he seats beside him oppresses him. He likes to think that the relationship has seen its golden days and it was beginning to crumble. What was it really that made his head reel just now? "I think I'm going by the bays instead," he says between Kogure's words.

This of course made Kogure wince. Although he harbored an assumption glowering from the suggestions of the sophomore's twitching eyebrows, his eyes cannot hide a staggering soul. He looks for appropriate words, but his lips would not move at all; an unspoken truth of so-called difference can only get blatant and malodorous, and so Kogure ceded to a stillness which spoke too meaningfully for its own good. He stares at him, long enough for the birds to start flapping their wings, away from them, away from the tightrope they're treading. At his mind's eye, he wished to be a jay.

"Wanna come?" he continued, trying to grasp whatever Kogure's face evoked.

"...you're catching fish?" was the reply.

"Ah y'know me well Kimi-kun," he says, kissing Kogure's cheek, closing the door and starting the car's engine. The kiss of course was compensation, and he wasn't rueful to think of it that way. Not at the least. Some hours later and they parted with a few words and long silences afterwards. Sendoh drops him off to Shohoku's main entrance and told russet-eyed he might have an overnight with Hikoichi and the team, emphasizing the role of the freshman's sister to further a sense of intimidation from within Kogure. And he kisses him goodbye like he's a faceless ghost.

The heavens are cheering him up, at least Kogure thinks so as he looks up at the afterglow of the sun. He bathes into its light as he walks for the gym, and in the distance he can hear the strained voice of Hanamichi, the laughing Mitsui and the serious Akagi. The bouncing sounds are heard, and he feels himself touching the ball, trying to shoot. He would like to think of the team as a haven of some sort, the leviathan of a place where Kogure can relinquish himself just for the sake of it; but then a growling heart thinks this place was more of compensation, too.

"Megane!" was the first declaration.

"Hello Hanamichi. Hey," he smiles voluntarily, basking in the acceptance that his teammates are emanating like they're long lost family.

"Missed us?" Mitsui says, elbowing his side.

"Yeah yeah... making progress yes?"

"Definitely! Megane, how's the exam?"

"'Twas okay Hanamichi. Where's Rukawa?"

Where did that come from anyway?

"Hmm... I wonder," Mitsui replies with a teasing tone, caressing his chin and almost whistling rubbish as the vice-captain shies away.

"He went to Tokyo for some unknown reason. Of course, Rukawa likes to keep everything to himself," he continues.

"Megane! How was Tokyo eh? Many many sushi?"

"Shut up Hanamichi, he's tired from the exam." Akagi finally enters the seeming pandemonium, and attempts to thump a certain redhead but missing, infuriating him.

"I can't practice today, I'd rather watch."

And so he watches. Long minutes passed and the pale fox dresses himself for practice. He sits at the uppermost stair-like benches, and his dreamy thoughts begin to weigh him down, yet again, and he can feel himself carrying the forsaken gymnasium. The polished floors metamorphose into calloused skin as more running come to pass, and he's seeing them like celestial motions against the finite terrains of the hall. He sees Miyagi do a lay-up; and he suddenly reckons the spike-haired doing the same three weeks ago. Such fortuity; at the bench, his angst.

What was he to expect anyway, being born from the cocoons of three fortuitous episodes? A feeling of self-commiseration begins to burden him, turning into easily answered queries of the despondent idealist heart, turning into a fatalism which foreboded eternally recurring attempts to domesticate the wildness of everything that is the blue-eyed youngster. He's too kind, he muses, and too hopeful that the striking innocence within him has forgotten all the harshness that accompanied it. But then would he really eviscerate this optimism?

His phone rings. Everyone took a halt for a second.

"Sorry... don't mind me," he says, pushing a button. "Hello?"

"Let's meet tonight," says the all-too-familiar husky voice.

"Meet? I thought you had an overnight," he whispers, sensing the eavesdropping Rukawa.

"I took a raincheck. Tonight please?"

"I'm honestly tired. I can't go anywhere,"

"I'll pick you up then."

"Would you?"

The other line was silent.

"Six. I'm picking you up."

"I don't mind."

"See ya then," and the line went dead. Kogure thinks of arbitrariness as the culprit as his thoughts scatter into the universe of a psyche, and he can feel an ache from somewhere in his head. A meager nuisance can be scoured, a slight excitement and a measly hope; these feelings are escorted with a mind taking caution to intentions; but with an idealist heart a romantic can go depths of killer bees to reach the glistening honey.

At the other end of Kanagawa, the cobalt-eyed resumed his fishing as the conversation ended. Now here he despises himself at the odd contradiction which stings him deadly, a striking foolishness and an arresting compromise, these dualisms which afflicted a sense of self-disdain and terror at the same time. On one end was the feeling of dearth within himself, an emotional famine that only genuine gestures of mediations can nourish, something the russet-eyed is adroit of. But with this sense of incompleteness was also the feeling of distaste, apathy and boredom at the slightest presence of Kogure, reeking of the tediousness of the so-called mediations.

He sardonically smiles at himself, this composite of clowns of who made a town out of his body.

And so he drives en route Shohoku's main entrance, availing for himself enough time to deliberate this open-ended dispute within himself. This warring mix of longing and revulsion spirals too much for a brew that it's almost poison; and to realize that, all these are born from too raw of a choice. What if he didn't enter the bar, if he didn't see a contrast to this man of fortuity, if he didn't spot him at the sidewalks, if he didn't see him at all? It was so much easier before; and so says his thought – caring is creepy.

He blamed the seer next.

The brown-haired captain on the other hand was left with one choice if he's to meet him. The clouds have turned too grey, indicating a heavy downpour; the sun doesn't like the him at all so it hides up the vertical. Thirty five minutes have passed and the freshmen were left to make sure that the floors of the gymnasium shone against the bleak light of the afternoon, and Kogure was sitting by the concrete stool beside the sliding doors of the gym. He's done enough intervals to interrupt the team, and so he tried to slacken outside with an utmost sense of hope, waiting for hope. A drop of the sky's oceans trickled down the foliage, not really much of a morning dew, and soon the waters shine heavy on him.

The lightning roars, thereupon Kogure shifted his body, leaning against the wall protected by the unfriendly shade of the gym's doors, and the roof can only do much as to not drench his body. He looks up, and a jewel dropped on his glasses. He sighs, taking it off, wiping it with a handkerchief. "It's like it hasn't rained for a year," he whispers.

"Hnn."

He stares at the raven-haired as the fox feigns to mop the floor. Both of them eat silence for food for thought, trying to eavesdrop each other's thought-designs. Here stands a man who looked like the spike-haired, a pale youngster who presumably had the similarities; it's become upsetting, and Kogure thinks of the times that this freshman failed to stir an interest. His insinuations are comical if not lackluster; but now, thinking about it, who is an original anyway?

"Your stare is disturbing Rukawa."

So he looks away, feigning yet again to mop the floor. It occurs to the vice-captain now that; this pale youngster before him never really needed a comfort of sorts, something he's adroit of – there was no sense of duty to be a safeguard, only companionship.

"Why do you hate me?" whispers the fox, surprising the senior.

"I... I don't hate you Rukawa. I... well I'm sorry if you feel that way," he mutters, his right sleeve wet. "It's just that I'm so confused at what you do."

"Why?"

He stares at him, only growing harrowing.

"I don't really know if you like me or not."

"Oi fox! Come here and mop this freaking floor darn it! This's all unfair!" declares Hanamichi while Yasuda assumes the role and mopped those floors instead.

"Then I like you."

He felt an empathy surging like the downpour.

"I don't like your style either."

"You really like him?" was the reply.

There was a bit of hesitation on his part a few seconds before whistling a yes. "_What d'ya think of relationships?_" Kogure says, ever so soft, like he's talking to himself.

The skipping heartbeats turn into a long fall of silences. The drenched asphalt against rubber created a swooshing sound at the verge of friction, and a penetrating shriek can be heard as the car stops. The window opens to reveal the waving arm and smiling face of the Ryonan ace, and Kogure can feel a sense of sadness on both ends of his sight, these two before him. These blue-eyed youngsters; the other needed an emotional safeguard while the other one reveled in mere presence. Who is winning? Who is he betting to win?

"I'm happy for you then," came a voice, ever so soft against the seeming callousness of this Shohoku ace. "And much better off without glasses."

And after a few more hours, Sendoh would finally decide to drive towards Hikoichi's place (and spend the night drinking away with his teammates) and drop Kogure in front of his house. And for the lack of better things to do, he justifies, he strolls away from his home; and the brown-haired would spend the night quasi-tutoring the allegedly delinquent Rukawa. The night clears away with a sense of quandary for Kogure, a warring mix of presence and incorrigible obligation; and all these contradictions and oddities of convictions would persist for a few more months.

* * *

_tbc._


	7. Version 4

_References to Ash, Tori Amos, The Shins & Beck. Last part is reference to the first chapter. Thanks to Castor&Pollux for the reviews as well as the others. Standard disclaimers apply; flames/reviews welcome, as always._

**CARNIVAL TOWN Version 4**

**_In which the Seer Returns with a Vengeance & the Story Ends_**

* * *

Time ached with a breakneck swerve down the minds of the youngsters and they got an almost infallible norm for themselves, these routinely manners by which they express their so-called liaison. Days turn into busied minutes, nights become languid hours of touching bodies; encounters are spoken within the limits of the body, feelings're described by the finitude of words rolling between their tongues. Weekends become fleeting phone conversations and workdays are empty exchanges of concerns. In the afternoon Sendoh and Kogure would love to hate each other; and by midnight both of them would love to love each other. 

Rukawa was quite lost in this vicious circle of a relationship, articulating a vernacular of silence which meant to question the intentions of keeping this foolishness in the first place. For Kiminobu and Akira knew they were living a fairytale of compromise; boredom become vicious gestures, and Kogure would take the spike-haired back and let him lick his wounds. And what was it really that made him wince? Jealousy is almost innate; and his own allusions towards Kogure are becoming more unsexy than ever. As the burning orb between the vertical of clouds glares at his narrowed eyes, he walks nonchalantly for rooftop; a pedestal he'd like to own, a leviathan of a place which made him relinquish any privilege for pretense. It was lunch break, and warm air is twinge like pricked needles on his back; unfriendly, and yet it was the only place which consoles him.

It occurs for the fox now that; lonely people are all the same.

He looks below, touching the fence and it makes a clanging echo. Ants are the students leisurely walking at the grounds; he can feel them far-eyed, these moving automatons differentiated only by the colors of their uniforms. A girl seems to look at him, smiling, and the fox raises an eyebrow for a grimace. He then sprawls himself by the shades the water tank provides, taking his notepad to cover his sight. His breath against the paper is moist, and his fingers suddenly touch his lips as he harks back that day, that bewildering day, the day in which he spoke the longest string of words possible.

He crosses the vacation off his time's list. In one month's time he'd be a sophomore and he'd win that MVP award. In four weeks time he'd finally see the class' end, and after thirty days he would no longer be able to stumble upon this foolish senior (on a daily basis), this host of individual maturities and serenities. Rukawa likes to think of himself as a safeguard to this seemingly feeble existence that is Kiminobu Kogure, feeling his own sense of obligation; but with more than enough sessions bordering on nightly lectures and casual kisses, with more than enough time to know him better, he was actually far superior than him. Not to basketball that is, but Rukawa admits a sense of submissiveness which abounds even at the far-flung apparition of the brown-haired.

Does he really like this senior? Yes, but what if his loneliness's just want some company? Why does he hate Haruko that much? Why can't this Sendoh just die?

The sun begins to move and the clouds disperse when a strong waft of hot breeze started to cringe Rukawa, and so he suddenly sits. He leans by the fences, shifting his weight so that he was opposite of the water tank as it protected him from sunburn. Time begins its pace, slowly at that as he thinks of all these predicaments, these visions of the russet-eyed, the intimidating glory of the basketball team, the lameness of Sendoh; for Kogure however, time was quick enough to slip past the Shohoku ace, unnoticed, trying to find a better angle to tap the other's shoulder.

"You're here," he says with closed eyes, gathering all courage.

He smiled. "Yeah. Got ye'r message at my locker. Went earlier than the scheduled time, ne?"

So the freshman stood up, and his hands were dusting off his uniform; he unfastens one button for some fresh air, but he was still perspiring like he would in a tournament. What was it really that made him wince?

"So what's up?"

"I... I don't want you to tutor me."

Kogure raised an eyebrow, and his face form a smile afterwards. "Yeah okay."

"Don't want to stalk you 'nymore."

"Uh... okay."

"No more stares."

"Okay, sure. Hey," Kogure says, almost afraid to strike any more intimidation for he's been one thought ahead of him. "What d'ya really wanna say Rukawa?"

"Break with him."

"Who made it your–"

"I want you to break with him," he says again, loud enough for Kogure to sense an urgency lay hidden with those words, reminded yet again of the ace's so-called sentiment rousing in the tip of his terse words. And yet these clipped sighs meant too much that it was beginning to be a puzzle piece. For several months now this pale youngster before him has become more or less compensation after the wearisome (but blissful at the same time) moments with Sendoh; and thinking about this, a feeling of culpability begin to flourish with his sympathy. His silence was met with a quizzical look, and no sooner did he realize himself motioning the freshman to sit, and a long fall of silences soon devours them.

"Rukawa," he sighs, not smiling at all.

Earshot begins to awaken.

"I... uhm... y'know I always think of this and it earns merit," says the russet-eyed while Rukawa nods. "And I could always pretend he still likes me... that way I won't be afraid of spending the night with him,"

"I could curse him, but I've lost my innocence to this mess, too," he continues.

With the senior's silence, he begins to speak. "He only wants you naked."

This begets a scathing smile. "Maybe, maybe not."

"He only likes himself,"

"And that makes him... frail. Y'know I've often hated myself for this stupid altruism in me."

This emotional tremor before him has only furthered Rukawa's inferiority as he immerses himself into this void of stillness and took them dreamy-eyed, delving deeper, wishing for themselves something almost impossible. This nausea against the power of spike hairs, cobalt eyes and pale body; this bout that was too open-ended for a dispute that Rukawa can only muster a breath for answer. "Y'know relationships are choices, y'know, like basketball," says the russet-eyed suddenly.

"And choosing can only be in a matter of seconds. Many many choices you got no time to rationalize, and by the time you do you'd regret it outright. Excruciating ne?"

"What do you choose now?"

And yet the question meant more than a choice, it was a genesis of insinuations rousing Kogure to fascination, while the pale fox, for the lack of appropriate state of mind, threw an inquiring stare. He never really knew the motivating dynamics by which this raven-haired before him endured all these foolishness, and he would still like to think that Rukawa was only skirting between fascination and being comical. Yet surely, there's an odd magnetism to this humor; it's not a promise to a relationship but it's much better than Sendoh making no commitments at all. The senior laughs in lightness, and afflicting this sickness to him, Rukawa too smirks.

"Much better smiling," the fox finally whispers. His right hand flex with the dexterity of his fingers, brushing up those brown locks from the senior's forehead. "Much better without specs," was the roaring sound in Kogure's audition, hesitating yet again. Rukawa takes the glasses off.

"What do you choose?"

Several kilometers away from Shohoku High School, a certain Sendoh Akira made his way through the hurried faceless crowd, and deciding to park himself at a local coffee shop, he began to dial an all-too-familiar number; he touches the phone with his ear next. The sun stood energetically, almost scorching him, and he shifted his weight to move his chair so the shade can reach him. He hears the other line ringing.

"Hello?"

"It's me. Let's meet tonight. Please?"

He hears a sigh. "I can't right now. Schoolwork's exhausting."

"The carnival's set up for tonight, you haven't seen them last time yes?"

"I didn't."

"I'll pick you up then."

"Would you?"

He falters. "Six. That okay with you?"

"I don't mind."

"See ya then," he says, and he stares at the beaming Shinichi Maki whose facial expression more or less signified amusement.

"What?"

He sips his coffee as the blue-eyed looks down to see the former Kainan captain's bags drooping beside his ankle. He knew too well that Shinichi liked basketball more than anything else, and he also knew that America was more than obliged to welcome him and exploit his talents; something Shinichi knows of course. "The plane leaves in three hours, gotta make this quick."

"I told you I don't need a psychiatrist anymore."

"The more you need me then," he beams yet again, and sarcasm emanated to them both.

"We're fine,"

"So you say,"

"I said we're fine."

"And you? Talking in we is different yes?"

"I'm still me... I guess."

"Of course. You've always wanted to make things boring Akira, you and your boredom."

"Do you even remember you're the one who taught me this forsaken tenet of vanity? That you're a pious man worshipping a religion, this fucked-up beauty thing,"

Tensions rise.

"Hey, I never took change off my list. And you?"

He's silent.

"I can almost pity you right now Akira."

"You always pity me. Even those times–"

"You blame me for everything. And y'know that."

"Why... you changed so much,"

Shinichi Maki knew him too well; the words he spoke have become too repetitive it's become innate to deliberate this. The shade has stretched onto both of them and the sun receded to the amassed whiteness of the clouds, and the stillness of it all has somehow soothed this Ryonan youngster, whilst Maki presumes he's done rationalizing. It's been certain now that the rules of the game were created by the ingenuity of Maki's previous way of life; and actually even the game was an oeuvre in itself. But this art will soon have to decay, it will soon become a past self, it will have to see its golden days so that it can crumble; and new rules will be made.

"Everybody's gotta learn sometimes."

And so when all lessons are learned Sendoh accompanied him to the airport. He comes back with a seemingly relieved sense of lightness that he drove himself to the carnival even if it's still four-thirty; Kogure was used waiting for him every time he's scheduled an encounter, premeditations molded with contradictions of excitement and remorse. He parks his car and took his strides, touring the carnival. Few people came this early, and he was more than happy with this ambience; so much space, and even the dusty winds are soothing him. Several men work themselves to set up the tarpaulin, and an engineer is directing his men as they position the light bulbs. The tents are slowly mounting; and thinking about Kogure's reaction at the mood the carnival should be able to render them both, he smiles with excitement.

The orange hue of the afternoon sun did not foster playfulness within the carnival but it did flourish with a new view for him. Yes, Kogure was right; memories are beautiful but only those you want to live with. He thinks of the seer as the carousel's pre-recorded theme resounded throughout the place, and he can remember himself and the prophet of fib, his skepticism, the animated children whispering through his earshot, the chauvinistic boisterousness, Haruko's femininity and everything else in between.

His sight takes a good look at the gypsy-colored tent, recalling a sense of disapproval. So he walks towards it, ready to divulge everything and ready to prove the seer wrong. He takes some bills out, and he enters the marquee. There were no candles inside, and the room smelt of an all-too-familiar aroma – dust, and the humid, freshly cut grass. He expected her more than anything else.

"Hello?"

A slight rustle, a step backwards; and trying to sidestep the uneasiness.

"You," she says, and she doesn't motion him to sit.

"Uhm... a reading?"

"I already gave you one."

He smiles. "That what last year,"

"Though I'd like to prove you wrong," he continues, admitting a sense of triumph over her.

She stares at him. "You don't learn."

"I did learn about your prediction,"

"Akira Sendoh... you're not perfect but you're excellent at what you do,"

He shifts his left hand, putting it in his pocket. He looks at her. "I think you've already told me that."

"And so will I say it again because you didn't learn."

"Huh?"

"I tell you, everyone you know is perfect. You're the one who's not, yet you're good at what you do,"

"I don't under–"

"Don't you see boy? Even Kogure's too human for you."

"Hey how–"

"They're all perfectly human, and you," she walks slowly towards him, "You're just trying to be one. Learn from now on."

So he walks out of the tent with vagueness and antipathy drowning him to no end. The dusty plains are now oceans, too deep for a swim at that; and more than this was the realization of those all-too-human words which haunted him like a mantra. Hands on his pockets and his pace increases. All these for the remote concern for being condescending; and yet he felt that he was the seer who was proved wrong. Whatever emotional safety he earns makes him the prophet of fib; for he has always been lonely.

Truth was a stench, and one needs courage to have it. Yet surely; he's too excellent at what he does to give it all up just now. Short but cosmic minutes pass and he kept walking, the memory occupying the blue-eyed youngster of distant coolness and self-buoyancy. The carnival man of cobalt eyes stared hazily at the retreating sun and the orange clouds, smiling at himself; and as the broken disc music plays throughout the plains he now understands that Kiminobu Kogure would not be meeting him tonight.

* * *

_fin._


End file.
